The number of bishops in the global Catholic Church has increased by just over one per cent to 5,430.

The latest figures compiled by the Vatican's Central Office of Church Statistics, looked at Catholic Church trends between 2022 and 2023, across all continents.

In Africa, the share of bishops in the world rose from 13.8 per cent in 2022 to 14.2 per cent in 2023.

The figures were largely unchanged across other continents.

On average there were 259,000 Catholics per bishop, with 365,000 and 334,000 recorded for Africa and America, respectively.

In Oceania one bishop is responsible for 87,000 Catholics.

The figures show that at the end of 2023, 406,996 priests were ministering globally, meaning numbers had decreased by 734 compared with the previous year.

The number of permanent deacons, who work pastorally alongside priests, were found to be the group of clergy that is growing most vigorously. In 2023, their number increased by 2.6 per cent reaching 51,433 compared to 50,150 in 2022.

Permanent deacons were found to have a greater presence in those areas where candidates for the priesthood were lower.

The same report found that the global Catholic population increased by just over one per cent between 2022 and 2023, rising from approximately 1.3 billion to 1.4 billion.